UMBC wins 61-58: The recap

The Bearcats and Retrievers went toe-to-toe for 40 minutes, neither team led by more than six points and the lead changed hands 14 times in the game. Jimmy Gray had a chance to send the game into overtime with a 3-pointer at the buzzer, but it was off-line.

TURNING POINT: The Bearcats trailed by just one point, 55-54, after Roland Brown’s free throws with 2:36 left to play, but they allowed Chase Plummer to muscle his way into a layup in the post and then they committed back-to-back turnovers. One of those turnovers led to dunk by Plummer. The Bearcats were lucky enough to only be down four points after the turnovers, but they wasted valuable time without even taking a shot off.

YOU MIGHT WANT TO GUARD Brian Neller: The UMBC guard drained six 3-pointers against the Bearcats. He did not attempt a shot from inside the arc, but he certainly knocked down a few from well beyond the line on his way to score 18 points.

The Bearcats tried playing a box-and-one with Mike Horn following Neller all over the court. That move seemed to keep Neller from getting the ball or getting clean looks, however, the Bearcats did not stay with that defense for long.

BU coach Tommy Dempsey explained, “When (Ryan) Cook was out of the game, it was a lot easier to play the box. Cook was in foul trouble in the first half so I went too it. I was afraid of Cook as well. He’s their leading scorer. It’s hard to play box-and-one when they have another really good shooter, really good scorer on the court. When Cook was out of the game at times in the second half, I went back to it. When Cook was in, we kind of stayed away from it.”

IS STAT SO: The Bearcats won the battle of points in the paint, scoring 32 points inside compared to UMBC’s 16 points. Roland Brown scored five points off the bench and Alex Ogundadegbe scored two in three minutes. Brian Freeman scored six in 12 minutes, but had to spend a lot of time on the bench with foul trouble. He fouled out with 5:48 left to play.

Freeman may have been able to make it more difficult for Plummer to make an impact down the stretch.

“The thing with Brian is he doesn’t always have to win the position battle because of his length and athleticism,” Dempsey said. “Even if their guys can catch it in there, it doesn’t mean they can score over the top of him or drive it around him. He’s a little more mobile than some of our inside defenders. I thought for the most part we kept them from scoring in the paint. They just had some really big buckets in crucial spots.”

SIGHTINGS: Maret senior point guard Marlon Beck was on campus today and attended tonight’s game, seated behind the Bearcats bench with his family. Beck committed last Tuesday night. He cannot sign a National Letter of Intent until April. Beck said he came up late on Tuesday night, arriving in the early morning hours on Wednesday and then did the campus tour and met with coaches and athletic department people during the day.